Ranked #2940

Blame!

This title makes better sense if you have previously read the manga. The OVA jumps back and forth along the manga plot illustrating the key moments of Nihei's (Author of manga) scenic perspective of a chaotic world, so it is very hard for a newcomer to even try to decypher the storyline.

- ANIMATION -
The animation itself is clean and fluid, however many scenes are mere transitional still background frames showing in colour the world of BLAME! but those with movement truely show Nihei's disturbing imagination.
Yet the series' production team was not entirely faithful to his drawing style so the characters are not identical to their manga counterparts.

- SOUND -
The music was an important asset to the OVA, it was the mixture of mechanical/industrial and eerie tunes that really gave the impression of 'desertedness' and the immensity that is the Megastructure cyborg world. It is almost as if you were cast into the darkness of that place and left to wonder what things are lurking in there. The ending themes are varied and on one particular occassion reminded of extracts from Marilyn Manson.

- STORY & CHARACTER -
In terms of the storyline and character development; the fact that the viewer needs prior knowledge of the series limits the score for these categories. It is very hard to see anything coherently with the storyline at first and even the manga needs you to concentrate and re-read certain plots. Yet despite this, its really a bizarre original series.

- VALUE & ENJOYMENT -
I have mixed feelings towards this series, I have read the manga and I believe this really should have been a larger production (full on series). If they followed the manga plot entirely in a more 'user-friendly' manner then it would have really been above the likes of movies such as Matrix or other highly regarded sci-fi/horror/action titles.
Nihei is an awesome author with a vivid sick mind but unfortunately the production team have not done justice to BLAME! OVA as it falls short of really inticing the viewer. It is a shame, since it degrades it into some form of fanservice/promo for the manga instead. read more

This anime is just a small collections of moving images from the manga really. Thus it is only any fun at all if you've read the manga and loved it.
There is no story to it, though there does seem to be a point to it (it certainly brought something to my attention).
The animation looks good, I liked it.

Since it doesn't show any more then just a few scenes, there's no story of itself whatsoever, character development is non existent and none of it will make any sense to you at all if you haven't thoroughly read the manga and remember every single detail. The manga is my absolute favorite ever and even I had trouble following what was going on at first.

So, watch it if you liked the manga, but leave it if you don't know it or didn't like the manga... read more